I think I would have liked this book if I hadn't read Robert Cormier's book Tenderness first. As it was, The Long Night of Leo and Bree gave me a bad taste in my mouth. I don't know if it really was, but it SEEMED like a total Tenderness ripoff (only with a happier ending). I couldn't feel for either of the characters -- especially Bree -- and the ending was not believable. ( )

This is a gripping story, and packed full of pain even though it is so short. Leo's sister was killed four years ago this night, stabbed to death by her crazy boyfriend. This set off a series of events which caused Leo's family to disintegrate and his mother to go crazy. His mother provokes him, and then he sees Bree walking along the street, dressed to go to a bar she is far too young for. Bree has gone to the bar in another town to escape the life she feels is already planned for her. Leo kidnaps Bree, thinking his sister has told him to, and takes her to the basement of his apartment house. There he and Bree begin to talk and sort through this mess. Somehow Wittlinger gives the story a hopeful ending. While this book is short, there is a lot of violence, so it definitely is an older teen book. However, seeing how the two come together to get Bree released successfully is really interesting.

Even though this is a fairly brief book, there is a lot packed in it. Reading it a second time made me realize a lot of things I hadn’t seen before in this novel – like the fact that Leo’s sister Michelle who was killed was bullied by her boyfriend, and Bree, who is smart in most other ways, is bullied at home and by her boyfriend. Both of their sisters died, although in different ways. This time I didn’t feel as tense while I read the book, since I knew that everything would sort of turn out okay. But in the end, while you know that the characters will change, you don’t really see them change and know what happened to them. Still a very powerful book. ( )